250 Million Reasons Californians Are Nuts!

[Boorish Grobian]

250 million bucks for a soccer player?  WTF?
YEESH!
Fax

[jpchenet]

250 million bucks for a soccer player?  WTF?
YEESH!
Fax

$250M for a soccer player who is passed his prime.................even worse!!!!!!!!!! 

[Chris24]

Wouldn't you like to be David Beckham at the moment though ! Or any moment for that matter. Or at least for a moment long enough to transfer his money into your account before becoming yourself again.

I am guessing that this isn't about 1 club , and that the US Football league is bank rolling this to try and raise the profile of football in the USA.

To Beckham though, he's milked England, Europe and Japan, so now time to milk the USA.  I wonder if there is enough money for him to milk in Russia when he is done with the USA ?

[Boorish Grobian]

For all of us who are forty-something, this all sounds very, very familiar.  Anyone remember when a past-his-prime Pele joined the New York Cosmos for big bucks to "raise the profile of soccer in the US"?  The big difference being Pele didn't have a big pile of money when he joined the Cosmos.  How much money does Beckham need?   On second thought, he's got a expensive wife
Hell, for $250,000,000 I could afford to fix my VW Golf's transmission with NEW parts.
Fax

[gab]

...remember when the NASL (I think that was the leagues name  ) first started up and contracted the likes of former superstars like Pele, Beckenbauer, etc. They were good drawing cards for awhile but not long, league went belly-up after a bit. I wonder how much influence Mrs. Beckham had on the final decision, as I hear it she has already been searching for a home in the LA area for quite some time. Good luck to the Beckhams, Hollywood is the perfect place for the both of them.

[Christopher]

As long as it reduces the amount of column inches he and his dank looking wife spend in the UK press......then it has to be a good thing.

[mgmark]

Come on now folks.  £70k a day.  In it for the money?  - you're all being so cynical.........

After all, he says that "soccer is huge all around the workld except in America and that's where I want to make a difference with the kids.  I don't want to go out to America at 34 and people saying 'he's only there to get the money' I want to hopefully build a team that have a lot of potential and that excites me". 

Isn't that nice of him.......so for those across the pond standby for the marketing onslaught of a sport which after a 90-minute game frequently ends up with nobody scoring a goal.....

MG Mark

[oldtimer]

a sport which after a 90-minute game frequently ends up with nobody scoring a goal.....

Maybe so Mark, but it is still infinitely more interesting, skillful and entertaining than the so called football that the Americans have to put up with now.  A bunch of heavily armoured goliaths running into each other and then stopping while the networks run the adverts on the TV.  Pot and kettle when I hear Americans complaining of others doing things for the money.  Looks to me like the whole of American society is designed for exactly that atttitude.  Good luck to him I say.

[mgmark]

a sport which after a 90-minute game frequently ends up with nobody scoring a goal.....

Maybe so Mark, but it is still infinitely more interesting, skillful and entertaining than the so called football that the Americans have to put up with now.  A bunch of heavily armoured goliaths running into each other and then stopping while the networks run the adverts on the TV.  Pot and kettle when I hear Americans complaining of others doing things for the money.  Looks to me like the whole of American society is designed for exactly that atttitude.  Good luck to him I say.

Tongue in cheek I was - agree with you about the qulaity of the game, even though football isn't my cup of tea - and few of us wouldn't take that sort of opportunity if it was a possibility - imagine being able to buy your average supercar for cash after about 2 or 3 days "work" playing a game.....

MG Mark

[oldtimer]

Sounds good to me!

[monkey]

I have to say that in money and business terms I think this is a win win win, the club will make and sell shirts and other Becks merchandise, they will profit say about £20.00 per shirt so that means to completely cover their costs on shirt sales alone, they need to sell around 790K shirts over five years. I reckon they could do that in two. The media will be interested, and will pay to show the games, sponsorship will increase across the sport. Interest in the sport of Football (real) in the US will increase and the revenue from that will be huge. Personally I think the whole thing is quite brilliant. The only downside is that in around twenty years time I could imagine the USA winning the World Cup, (for our American friends its a competition held every four years that actually does feature teams from all around world) and us having to play as Europe to stand any chance of winning it back.

Well done Becks, thanks for everything mate and good luck for the future.

[Nobby Diesel]

Shirts is most certainly a prime consideration for the club.

Other merchandising, not so sure. Whatever you say or think about Beckham, his business advice is pretty sound. He owns the image rights 100%.

Anyway, lets just say any of us were offered the same job we are doing now, but in an arena where it will be alot easier to stand out and all in the last couple of years of our career. And for a lot more money. How many of us would turn it down?

If there is someone daft enough to pay that sort of money, there will certainly be plenty of people happy enough to accept it.

Having been a great servant to his team and country in the past (remember he was the only player trying against Greece in the WC qualifier at Old Trafford), I hope he does well outside of football too.

I think the Brits are a little too quick to dismiss success. Good luck to the bloke. I'm not a particular fan of his, but he has done well for himself and his family. Hopefully, he will avoid ending up like many past footballers; a sorry old soak.

All IMO.

[termietermite]

That's exactly 1000 Saleen S7s, Fran.  500 each?

[mgmark]

That's exactly 1000 Saleen S7s, Fran.  500 each?

Wow - just think of the huge range of colours and trim that you could dream up with that many......

MG Mark

[Andy Zarse]

Fair play to Becks, he's quite a clever lad for a thicko!

But good luck, nobody can tell me seriously that he shouldn't take the money. It's just the terrible prospect of his ghastly wife parading around Hollywood getting "papped"and being in every copy of Hello magazine I pick up. And I'm cancelling my subscription to OK!